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Posted 7/6/2013 5:12 PM (GMT 0)
I've begun to wonder if I'm becoming a hypochondriac! I was diagnosed with osteo about 13 years ago at the age of 34 and found ways to live with it until my knees became so painful it was increasingly difficult to walk. I had both knees replaced last year. I guess I assumed I would be like brand new afterwards, but it seems now that everything BUT my knees hurt! I can only assume that my knee pain was so intense before my replacements that it was all that I really noticed. But now when I thought I'd be feeling like a teenager again, I hurt.

The strange part is that it seems to "cycle" if that makes sense to anyone. It seems that I'll go for weeks with a lot of pain in my jaw, neck, shoulders, upper back, feet, wrist, hand and upper arm. Then, miraculously, the pain goes away for another few weeks. Then it returns again. Does anyone have the same issue with cycles of pain? After my surgeries and long recoveries I feel like a constant whiner. Am I supposed to just live with it? Like the song says, I'm much too young to feel this dang old!

Posted 7/6/2013 5:41 PM (GMT 0)
I have pain cycles, but it's more like it cycles between joints. It'll be my hands for a while, then hips or ankles or wrists or... you get the picture. I'm also very weather sensitive and a falling barometer will immobilize me.

I have a pain management routine that steps up as the pain increases. I take Mobic daily, then Tylenol if that doesn't control the pain, then tramadol if I'm still having pain. I also have a muscle relaxant to take when my muscles board up from the pain. The Tylenol I end up taking twice a day pretty routinely, the tramadol only sometimes and usually at bedtime.

I still have pain, and I never expect to be pain-free, but this keeps it to a manageable level for me. I also find that working out with non-weight bearing cardio as well as resistance training helps decrease my pain.

I worked with a rheumatologist to develop my pain-control regimen; you might want to consider this also. And over the years I've learned to just ignore a lot of pain.
Posted 7/7/2013 1:36 AM (GMT 0)
Thanks for the reply, Judy. My new GP thinks telling me to take Tylenol is helping me manage my arthritis shakehead . I did call the office the other day and request something for those days when Tylenol just doesn't cut it and suggested a prescription for Tramadol or a referral to a Rheumatologist. I've taken Celebrex in the past as well as Aleve on a daily basis pre-TKRs and did not want to deal with stomach issues is why I asked for something different. So far, the Tramadol doesn't seem to be helping at all, but maybe it's something that helps the more regularly you take it?

I know completely what you're talking about when you say you ignore a lot of the pain. That's what I did for a long time where my knees were concerned, until it was impossible to ignore any longer. I guess I'm going to have to wing it for the most part and find a good solution for the pain when I'm in one of the cycles. I just found it strange to feel as though my body is "attacking" my joints a few weeks at a stretch and then just stops for a while.

Posted 10/16/2013 2:35 PM (GMT 0)
An update to this. I saw a hematologist over the summer due to low white blood cell count and after much testing, it seems that I'm one of those people who's wbc cycles up & down. When the wbc count is low, joint pain goes along with it and I think is probably what explain the cycles I was referring to.

The pain in my wrist/hand got so severe I knew that I'd be unable to do my job much longer (accounting - using a pen and computer mouse were agony). So I went to see a different GP who ran some tests and gave a referral to a rheumatologist whom I saw yesterday. (He has arthritis himself, dx at 21 so he gets it!) He's given me cortisone injections in my hand and elbow (due to my arm contracting up to my elbow and unable to straighten it) and a prescription for Diclofenac. He also gave me a reality check about how I needed to live my life in a different way in order to protect my joints and keep the pain away as long as possible. So glad I went to see him.
Posted 10/17/2013 2:22 AM (GMT 0)
It's important to keep moving. It may hurt at first but the more you do it the more the pain diminishes. I swim as much as I can. It's great exercise for arthritis.

I do have daily pain. I can't take NSAIDs so I have to depend solely on Tylenol and tramadol. When the pain gets bad I use heat or warm baths but I try to not just sit. That causes the joint to stiffen up more. I'm sorry. I know the pain sucks. I wish I knew a sure fire way to help.
Posted 10/17/2013 2:41 AM (GMT 0)
Actually, the doc nixed most everything except swimming. Told me absolutely not when I told him I wanted to do a Savage Race (mud run) with my big brother next spring and that I had just signed up with a personal trainer to get me to that goal. Said he didn't even want me going on long walks.

So once I got past feeling like the kid with polio who watches through the window all the other kids playing, I decided I would do what I could with the swimming. Fortunately, my personal trainer teaches yoga and aqua zumba/water aerobics and had already had me in the pool in one training session.

Back when I was first learning to live with osteo, I found out that the more I moved, the better I felt. So I went back to regular daily activities while taking Celebrex. (I used to supervise construction of homes, so toting lumber and moving concrete blocks wasn't unusual. I also used to do home-improvement projects with my husband like laying ceramic tile, etc.) No one really explained it to me like he did the other day. So when I thought my living normally was helping the joints stay lubricated, I was doing far too much causing deterioration. My joints need to last me another 40+ years, so I need to baby them to a certain extent.
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